


unsaid

by msermesth



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Hopeful Ending, Huddling For Warmth, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-18
Updated: 2019-02-18
Packaged: 2019-10-12 12:21:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17467448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/msermesth/pseuds/msermesth
Summary: When he had found out that Steve had gone missing, it did something to him. When he found Steve frozen in the snow as a blizzard raged, Tony became a new person.





	unsaid

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [If You Don't Mind the Scars (Remix)](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17376647) by [PjCole](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PjCole/pseuds/PjCole). 



It’s the little things.

The way Steve’s eyes track Tony’s movements as he searches the underground bunker they’ve been hiding in, or how he smiles when Tony catches him watching. The way Steve cheeks heat as blood begins to flood through them again.

The way Tony’s heart pounds at the thought of stepping closer.

The world has stopped, and Tony feels like all of his ability to process feelings has stopped with it. He’s overjoyed that Steve’s here, warm and safe, and all by his side, but that joy is confused, tempered, broken by the voice in his head that keeps telling him Steve is only looking at him like that because they might as well be the last people alive.

When he had found out that Steve had gone missing, it did something to him. When he found Steve frozen in the snow as a blizzard raged, Tony became a new person.

“I missed you,” Steve says, because it isn’t awkward enough between them.

Tony doesn’t say _I wished I knew that before_. He doesn’t say anything at all.

“Come here,” Steve says, because he must know Tony’s resolve is wavering.

Tony doesn’t ask _does this mean anything?_ He walks to Steve’s side, instead, and runs his fingers through Steve’s hair.

Steve leans into his hand. Tony likes the warmth of him, the realness of him. After so many years apart, after so many times he day dreamed about anything but comforting Steve, being here feels right, just. “Are you tired?” Steve asks.

 _Very._ “Not really.”

Steve pats the small twin bed that barely fits him. “Lay here with me.”

 _I want to._ “I’m not sure that’s the best idea.” The idea of slipping behind Steve, lining his body up perfectly against him, well… it does things. It breaks things in him, things that took so much time to build since Steve left.

“That’s okay.” Steve’s face falls like it’s not at all okay, and Tony wants to simultaneously prod at that look, feed Steve’s disappointment until the tension of the room breaks the walls, and needs to wipe it away with feather light kisses and gentle endearments.

The need wins and he settles into the tight space between Steve and the rough concrete wall. Steve scoots forward, just enough that Tony can fit, just enough that he’s balancing on the edge, knees hanging perilously off the cot. “Mhmm, warm,” Tony mutters under his breath, and yes, the side of him tucked perfectly against Steve feels like it’s next to the campfire up in his cabin in Banff, like Steve’s warmth is slowly flowing out of his body at every point of contact and filling in Tony’s hollow soul.

It’s the perfect contrast to the freezing cold wall behind him, to the feeling of ice in his veins when he thought Steve was dead.

“This has to be very familiar. Not many people wake up after being frozen _twice_.” Tony talks out loud because his brain never stops shouting at him and he needs something to drown it out. “How does this compare to the last time?”

Steve doesn’t respond right away and give Tony the respite he needs from his racing thoughts. “It’s…” he starts, eventually, the lighter tone of before gone, “better, I think. Less lonely this time. When that happened, I only noticed everything I had lost.” He turns his head, just enough that Tony can see the blue of his eyes. “But this time, I gained something instead.”

Tony tucks his head into his chest and averts his eyes from Steve’s strained gaze. “Sometimes, you’re just too much.” He means it, and it’s exactly what he’s thinking.

Steve is just more than he can fit into his life. He’s unwieldy, full of rough edges you’d never see at first glance, but magnetic and brilliant even further underneath that. Tony always wanted all of him and knew it was never in the cards. It had felt like compassion to have his heart broken, to find his limits and to be made to live within them for once.

“Sometimes, I don’t know what I’d do without you,” Tony says, and it hurts to articulate, because he knows what he would do. He’d live, which meant breathing and inventing and avenging. It meant moving forward but missing something so essential, everyday he was worn more and more down, his soul growing anemic, crying out for sustenance he thought he could never have.

“You have me, Tony,” Steve reassures him and reaches out behind him to grab Tony’s hand and pull it across his chest, close to his heart.

 _Do I?_ he asks himself. _Will you be mine when it’s time to reenter the world?_ “You can’t promise that.” He says it into the scruff of Steve’s neck, against the fine hairs at the edge of his skin.

“I’m not promising anything. You can’t promise what’s already true,” Steve says, sweet and earnest, and possibly on the verge of tears. Tony doesn’t know. Tony can’t see him.

And Tony sighs, because Steve always sees things in black and white, always as the world is, not what it could be. He confesses, “I’m not going to let go. And someday, you’ll want me to.”

Steve pulls Tony closer than he ever thought we be possible. Like this, there might as well be nothing separating them. “Then don’t. Let’s fight for this, like we fight for everything else.”


End file.
